Dunbar High School football standout plans for future, chooses Harvard

BALTIMORE - The Dunbar Poets, known as a football factory, just won their 12th state championship.

Dunbar's head coach Lawrence Smith doesn't like that narrative.

One of his senior players is helping to change that perception while also inspiring his classmates.

Josh Fedd turned down 13 other offers to attend and play college football at Harvard, an Ivy League School known more for its academics than athletics.

Fedd led Maryland high schools in sacks this season.

He wasn't thinking about football when he made his college decision.

"When you tell somebody you graduated from Harvard, it doesn't matter what degree or what class," Fedd said. "It's 'Oh you went to Harvard?' I want that for me in the workplace. I want that for me when I'm applying for jobs because, in the grand scheme of things, football has to end."

Fedd's head coach tells his players that playing football at Dunbar is a "vehicle to go to college."

Fedd has never lost a football game, has a perfect 27-0 record, and he's a two-time state champion. 

Off the football field, he has a 4.2-grade point average and is the top student in his class. 

He had all kinds of college offers. 

"My goodness," Fedd said. "This is Davidson College, St.. Francis University, Lehigh, UPenn."

Fedd said Dunbar's principal, Dr. Yetunde Reeves, is a big reason why Harvard was even on the table. 

"Once Dr. Reeves came here, she was able to put in those honors classes, those AP classes, those dual enrollment classes," Fedd said. "She was able to put somebody like me in the position where I could get into Harvard."

Fedd is the first football player Lawrence Smith has coached at Dunbar to go on to an Ivy League school. 

"I don't like the fact that people think that we are a football factory," Smith said. "I always tell the guys we can win as many championships as I want, once you walk off the field, your parent doesn't really care about that championship. Your parents want to know the next step. You should want to know the next step."

The next step for Fedd is going to Boston to attend Harvard. 

"I just kept pushing and pushing and pushing, just believing in me, believing in what I could do to get to the position that I'm in," Fedd said. I" really never had a true set dream, but where I'm at, I can say that I'm living one."